Fun with DIY: Beginner’s Recipe + Shopping List

As I’ve gathered from the feedback on some of my more involved recipes, like the Skinceuticals knock-off Vitamin C serum, I am a literal crazy person that version of DIY can be a tad overwhelming to those just dipping their toes in the rarified waters of homemade skincare.

So to those of you who want to get into DIY but don’t know where to start, I’ve put together a beginner’s shopping list and sample recipe. For the tools, I’ll link to items I use, but feel free to do your own research and get whatever tool fits your budget and desires.

This recipe only has six ingredients and doesn’t have separate phases, the way an oil and water emulsification would. It’s a lightweight, fast-absorbing essence that hydrates, brightens, and heals. Let’s take a look at what’s in it.

The titles are linked to the product pages on Lotioncrafter.com, my favorite supplier; if you buy the cheapest option for each, it’ll run you about $27 plus shipping and you can make about 7oz of essence. (The hyaluronic acid is the one you’ll run out of first – buy the next size up and you can make about 25oz.)

Centella asiatica extract: Centella is one of the two miracles in this miracle essence. The Indian Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences called it a “potential herbal cure-all“. It’s high in saponins, which have amazing wound healing abilities; it also features sterols, flavonoids, and fatty acids. It’s often used in acne-fighting products for its great antibacterial properties. I love it for its ability to soothe and heal my skin.

Niacinamide: my heart, my soul, my everything. One of the most studied skincare ingredients, niacinamide does everything: smooths fine lines and wrinkles, increases ceramide and fatty acid synthesis, regulates skin cell turnover, fades hyperpigmentation, evens skin tone, and has powerful anti-inflammatory properties. Use it up to 5% in your creations to kick everything up a few levels.

Hyaluronic acid: this is a skin-identical ingredient (meaning your body synthesizes it naturally) so it’s generally well-tolerated and you’re unlikely to have a bad reaction to it. It’s a powerful humectant, drawing moisture to your skin’s surface, and can plump, hydrate, and smooth your skin. For us DIYers, it has another great benefit: when combined with water, it forms a beautiful thin gel texture that serves as a fantastic base for toners, essences, and serums. **NOTE: In my recipe, I use 1% hyaluronic stock – in a glass bottle, combine 1% hyaluronic acid, 98.7% distilled water, and 0.3% Liquid Germall Plus. Let it hydrate overnight, and then you can keep it for up to a year and use it in any creation you want.

Liquid Germall Plus: if you’re creating DIY with any water or water-soluble ingredients (basically, anything that isn’t just a mixture of oils), you need a preservative. This is non-negotiable. You need a preservative. Preservative systems are tricky, so I tend to go with premade systems that feature multiple preservatives. Liquid Germall Plus is my favorite – it’s a powerful, broad-spectrum preservative that protects against just about anything you’d need to worry about.

Distilled water: you can buy a jug of this stuff from your nearest drugstore for $2. (Look for distilled/purified water, not just bottled water – you don’t want the minerals and stuff they put in Evian.) It not only serves as an important base for your DIY, it’s actually a fantastic skincare ingredient on its own – your skin needs water. This is a hydrating product we’re making, so we want as much water getting to your skin as possible!

To make this easier, I put the recipe and instructions into a Google Sheet:

The Shopping List

We’ve covered the ingredients, but you can’t just toss it all in a bottle and shake. You’ll need products to 1) disinfect your workspace; 2) measure out the ingredients accurately; 3) heat your product to kill of bacteria and fungus; and 4) put it in when you’re done.

The Must-Buys

You need one of each of these. I’ve linked to the product I use on Amazon, but feel free to shop around for one that speaks to you. These are non-negotiable for DIY.

A large, heat-safe container: you need something to hold the water you’ll heat and hold in. I use this borosilicate tub, but you can easily use a microwave-safe bowl or something that you already have for this beginner recipe.

If you buy everything on that list as I’ve linked it, it’ll run you about $81.

The Nice-To-Haves

These help a lot, and you’ll need them eventually if you keep going with DIY, but if you’re just trying DIY out, you can keep these on the wish list.

From left to right:

A hot plate: as you keep going with heating-and-holding, you can’t do the janky method I’ll describe below. A hot plate will let you hold a consistent temperature for all 20 minutes.

A trivet: while heating and holding, this simple silicone trivet keeps your beakers up off direct contact with the hot plate. It’s the same concept as a double boiler.

A large glass bottle: I pre-make my 1% hyaluronic acid stock in one of these 4oz bottles. It takes about 6 hours for hyaluronic acid to hydrate, so I just do this the night before and then I have HA stock for dayz.

A hand mixer: oh lord, this makes mixing SO much easier. It’s crucial for emulsions, where you need to really mix your shit, but it’s not as important for this recipe which doesn’t have an oil phase.

Disposable plastic boats: I measure out dry ingredients into this. If you don’t want to get these, you can put little squares of wax paper or tin foil on your scale and measure onto that.

Weigh out the niacinamide by using your spoon to scoop bit by bit into a plastic boat or little square of wax paper. Weigh out the other ingredients by using a clean pipette to add it slowly, drop by drop, into the beaker.

For the heat and hold section, if you don’t have a hot plate, then heat some tap water in a microwave-safe bowl until it’s 75 degrees celsius. Stick your beakers in there and leave it for 20 minutes, checking the temp every 5 minutes. If it drops below 65 degrees, heat up some more water and switch. This kills off bacteria and fungus, and helps everything dissolve and mix together.

Since some water will evaporate off during that process, steps 2 and 4 are about figuring how much water you lost and adding it back.

When you’re done, put it in your bottle either by pouring or using a clean pipette to transfer it over. (You don’t need to disinfect your bottle – it should come to you disinfected.)

Label the bottle with the name of the product and today’s date.

Enjoy, and welcome to the wonderful world of DIY! See you at the poor house.

I wouldn’t use just a regular tea bag – there’s a big difference between safe for consumption and safe to put on your face/add to a skincare product. Check out Lotioncrafter and Personal Formulator for other bases, like aloe vera juice or various hydrosols.

This is amazing!!! I have yet to start DIYing but I love how you walk me through each step and this recipe looks yummy for my face! Thank you so much for sharing this and I can’t wait to order the supplies to try it!

Hi! I’m a first year chemistry undergrad so while I’m not clued up on all the science behind it yet, I’m definitely comfortable in a lab so can’t wait to start DIYing! Though my kitchen will be a change of scenery haha. I wanna give this recipe a try before I do your vitamin C serum just to start slow but I can’t find calendula extract in the UK only calendula infusion (via grapefruit.co.uk) do you think this is the same or should I search harder or replace with a different extract? Thanks and absolutely love your blog!

Thanks so much!! Personally, I love centella more than calendula, so feel free to replace the calendula with another extract. Maybe licorice root if PIH/uneven skin tone is a problem for you, tamarind seed if your skin is dehydrated, or green tea for some overall antioxidant power 🙂

Awesome information! Thanks so much for putting this together. A quick note/question: The Amazon link for the beaker set isn’t working any longer, so I’m not sure which one you’re using. I found a 3 beaker set with 50/100/250 ml sizes; will those sizes work for most basic recipes or should I consider different ones for my starter set?

Thanks again for sharing your wealth of knowledge. I can’t wait to dive in and make a few things! 🙂

This looks like a great recipe. Quick question though just for clarification: the extracts already have preservatives in them. Because of that, do I really need to add another preservative like GermAll Plus or could I skip an additional preservative in such case? Thanks

I’m in AWE of your blog and I hope to make my first foray into DIY beauty soon! I’m currently assembling the materials with the help of this post. Thank you so much for sharing all this great information.

Question: I own a sous vide immersion circulator. It heats and holds water to a temperature I program; I love to cook, and it’s a great, geeky kitchen tool.

Is there any reason I couldn’t use my immersion circulator to heat the water bath to 75 C for the heat-and-hold step in this or any other recipe? I’m thinking perhaps I can avoid buying a separate hot plate + trivet, but is there something I’m missing? I would assume an immersion circulator might even be more precise than a hot plate, but I’m a total newbie here. The only possible problem I can think of is my sous vide requires a minimum water depth of 1.5″ to operate, and the circulation does create ripples in the water bath that could potentially tip over a beaker, but I would think as long as I used a big enough water container and a deep enough beaker — maybe I could even think of a way to brace the beaker — it should work…right?

Thanks so much for your prompt response! I realized later that this tech actually did get started as lab equipment before people co-opted it for the kitchen. Anyway, I can’t wait to get started. Thanks for providing such a wonderful resource.

Hey! i’m so confused re:the niacinamide & C thing..is it ok or not ok to mix them? Is it the C or the acidity i’m trying to avoid so i don’t turn it into niacin? (IF i’m actually trying to avoid it?); also, do you think Julie is referring to an E powder? If its a liquid oil, would one try to solubilize it w/poly80?
Aaagh! i was just writing to share a cool little trick i figured out for the weighing boats! (If you’re interested, you just take one of those plastic gallon jugs that you got your distilled water in, when empty, & a sharp pair of scissors, & you can make your own personalized ones that match the weighing platforms if, like me, you have multiple scales for different apps, & you can even make ’em like curved on 3 sides & flat/pointed on the 4th, for pouring, etc by utilizing the ‘shoulders’ of the jug & so on..it works pretty frickin well, if i do say so..)
Ok, so, back to this cliffhanger.. Acid Queen! TELL ME ALL the answers!!!.. Sorry, i’m feeling overly dramatic today(today! Scoff! Don’t you mean EVERY DAY, suki???..)
Anyways, i LOVELOVE your blog, your writing, your brain!, your skin care line, just YOU,
( in only a slightly-mostly creepy way)..re:my demanding queries, please answer at your leisure & convenience, & thank you in advance.
Muchlove, suki
P.s.i just now saw you said “same ROUTINE”, NOT SAME FORMULA..

Thank you so much for a wonderful recipe and detailed procedures! I have one question about one of the procedures. When you add back distilled water at step 5, should this distilled water to be added also be heated up to 70 degree Celsius before pouring into my beaker? Or, can I just add room temperature/a little cooler than that distilled water directly to my beaker? Thinking that to hold for 20 min in hot temperature is to kill off bacterias, I simply questioned whether the new distilled water should be treated as well. So I just wanted to make sure I understand it well before I dive into DIYing this recipe! Please let me know! Thank you so much!